Human bones are always remodelling by the repeated process of resorption and reconstitution. Osteoblasts and osteoclasts are considered to be the cells mainly responsible for bone formation and bone resorption, respectively. A typical example of a disease caused by abnormal bone metabolism is osteoporosis. Osteoporosis is known to develop when bone resorption by osteoclasts exceeds bone formation by osteoblasts, but the mechanism of osteoporosis has not yet been completely elucidated. Osteoporosis causes bone pain and makes bones fragile, leading to fracture, particularly in elderly patients. Osteoporosis has therefore become a social issue with the increasing number of elderly people in the population. Therefore, effective drugs for the treatment of the disease are expected to be developed. Bone mass reduction caused by abnormal bone metabolism is thought to be prevented by inhibiting bone resorption, improving bone formation, or improving the balance of bone metabolism.
Bone formation is promoted by stimulating growth, differentiation, or activation of osteoblasts. Many cytokines reportedly stimulate growth or differentiation of osteoblasts, i.e. fibroblast growth factor (FGF) (Rodan S. B. et al., Endocrinology vol. 121, p 1917, 1987), insulin-like growth factor-I (IGF-I) (Hock J. M. et al., Endocrinology vol. 122, p 254, 1988), insulin-like growth factor-II (IGF-II) (McCarthy T. et al., Endocrinology vol. 124, p 301, 1989), Activin A (Centrella M. et al., Mol. Cell Biol. vol. 11, p 250, 1991), Vasculotropin (Varonique M. et al., Biochem. Biophys. Res. Commun. vol. 199, p 380, 1994), and bone morphogenetic protein (BMP) (Yamaguchi, A. et al., J. Cell Biol. vol. 113, p 682, 1991, Sampath T. K. et al., J. Biol. Chem. vol. 267, p 20532, 1992, and Knutsen R. et al., Biochem. Biophys. Res. Commun. vol. 194, p 1352, 1993).
On the other hand, cytokines which inhibit differentiation and/or maturation of osteoclasts have also been intensively studied. Transforming growth factor-β (Chenu C. et al., Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA, vol. 85, p 5683, 1988) and interleukin-4 (Kasano K. et al., Bone-Miner., vol. 21, p 179, 1993) inhibit the differentiation of osteoclasts. Calcitonin (Bone-Miner., vol. 17, p 347, 1992), macrophage colony-stimulating factor (Hattersley G. et al., J. Cell. Physiol. vol. 137, p 199, 1988), interleukin-4 (Watanabe, K. et al., Biochem. Biophys. Res. Commun. vol. 172, p 1035, 1990), and interferon-γ (Gowen M. et al., J. Bone-Miner. Res., vol. 1, p 469, 1986) inhibit bone resorption by osteoclasts.
These cytokines are expected to be effective drugs for improving bone mass reduction by stimulating bone formation and/or by inhibiting bone resorption. Cytokines such as insulin like growth factor-I and bone morphogenetic proteins have been investigated in clinical trials for their effectiveness for treating patients with bone diseases. Calcitonin is already used for osteoporosis and to diminish pain in osteoporosis patients.
Examples of drugs now clinically utilized for the treatment of bone diseases and for shortening the treatment period are dihydroxyvitamine D3, vitamin K2, calcitonin and its derivatives, hormones such as estradiol, ipriflavon, and calcium preparations. However, these drugs do not provide satisfactory therapeutic effects, and novel drug substances are expected to be developed. Since bone metabolism is manifest in the balance between bone resorption and bone formation, cytokines which inhibit osteoclast differentiation and/or maturation are expected to be developed as drugs for the treatment of bone diseases such as osteoporosis.